


The Boy Who Couldn't Breathe Underwater Film Review

by Missmarvel



Category: SKAM (TV)
Genre: Blog, Director!Even, Even makes movies as extra as he is, Films, Future, Future Fic, Gen, Meta, Metafiction, Review, movie review
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-17
Updated: 2017-05-17
Packaged: 2018-11-01 19:06:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10928124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Missmarvel/pseuds/Missmarvel
Summary: In his latest film,The Boy Who Couldn’t Breathe Underwater, Bech Næsheim has managed to keep his sense of humor, do something fresh, and create a coming of age story that rings true.A meta film review of Even's future movie





	The Boy Who Couldn't Breathe Underwater Film Review

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Auteur Theory](https://archiveofourown.org/works/752805) by [scioscribe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scioscribe/pseuds/scioscribe). 



> Newest clip got me fucked up!! This hiatus is Killing Me. Have some meta fic

LGBTQ Film Club:  
The Boy Who Couldn’t Breath Underwater  
by Alex Reed  
September, 2032

Hey everybody, hope you're having a great, gay day! Today, we’re getting a little obscure. And by obscure, I mean European. And by European, I mean Norwegian.

I know what you're thinking: “Alex, I had misgivings about that extremely pretentious title before you said this movie was from the same country that invented clogs.” And I would say that that’s the Netherlands, and you're being racist. But seriously, I had my own misgivings. The writer-director, Even Bech Næsheim, is not known for his touching coming of age films. His most famous movie is _The Untamed_ (think Norway’s _Borat_ mixed with a little bit of _This Is Spinal Tap_ but with more convoluted dream sequences.). He's gained a cult following from the kind of guys who carry around skateboards and will quiz you on your music taste for his extreme, irreverent, and slightly(very) surreal sense of humor.

But with his latest film, _The Boy Who Couldn’t Breathe Underwater_ , Bech Næsheim has managed to keep his sense of humor, do something fresh, and create a coming of age story that rings true.

The film follows a bisexual teenage boy through the trials and tribulations of school, friends, and relationships. It has touches of a _Mr. Nobody_ -style parallel universe theory, but it doesn't take itself too seriously. In the kind of cheap yet disturbing gag we've come to expect from this filmmaker, the characters at one point inhabit an alternate universe where people's genitals are on their heads, and everyone is Ken-doll smooth. But, and I know this might sound strange, it blends seamlessly with scenes where everything remains exactly the same but the curtains are a different color while the main character has a breakdown about his parents' divorce. In fact, aside from the scenes where things are obviously off, like the one where everyone is played by an actor of a different race, the color of the curtains becomes the most important clue to the audience about what universe a scene takes place in.

Yeah, this is some _Inception_ -level shit. But a mix of raw emotion and absurdist humor stop this from being a movie based around a gimmick.

What I keep coming back to about this movie is how effortlessly it avoids the usual pitfalls and cliches of most teenage LGBTQ movies, or any teenage movie. For one, the characters aren't divided into those with so little personality anyone can project onto them and those who are played out stereotypes. Director Bech Næsheim has said that the main character draws a lot from how he himself was in high school(a pretentious yet lovable fuckface?), and watching his films, you can believe it. Just because it’s a teen movie, doesn't mean that the narrative is simplistic(far from it) or the imagery is obvious. The climax, set underwater in a universe where everyone can breathe perfectly well except for the protagonist, could have come off as heavy-handed metaphor. But the straight-faced acting of those around him as they confusedly ask what’s wrong makes the scene come of as wryly relatable to everyone who’s ever felt completely unrelatable(So, every teenager ever.).

Though the main character is openly bisexual and his main romantic interest in the movie is a boy, these facts aren't the entire focus of the movie, and neither are they completely glossed over. The entire plot isn’t based around how hard being an LGBTQ teen is. But the difference isn’t ignored, like it sometimes is in ‘progressive’ LGBTQ films that leave you feeling as though you’ve just watched a straight movie(And seeing as you’re on this blog, I'm guessing you don't want that.). It's the little things that make _The Boy Who Couldn’t Breathe Underwater_ feel real. “You could just, like, choose a girl though, right?” asks a friend in a universe where everyone walks on the ceiling.

When asked what his plans are for the future, Bech Næsheim said in an interview last June, “I'd like to do something about mental health--not some horror movie in an insane asylum, or some depressing thing about Alzheimer's, but something drawn from my own experiences. So, another narcissistic movie, I guess.”

Judging from Bech Næsheim’s first foray into semi-autobiography, I'd say narcissism suits him.

**Author's Note:**

> I love kudos and comments!  
> Also, I made [this playlist](https://8tracks.com/conversing/woke-boys) because I think I'm funny.


End file.
